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Consecration Aids: 23: Total Dependence
Fr. Christopher Lee, SMM
T HERE are many reasons for my being happy tonight. The principal one is that today is March 25, the Feast of the Annunciation.
Outside it’s been raining all day. But inside – inside of me, I mean – it’s been a bright sunny day. And the reason is obvious for anyone who knows that this is the principal feast of the Holy Slavery. It’s the day on which Mary proclaimed herself the slave of the Lord. It’s the day on which the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity enslaved Himself in Mary’s womb to remain a captive there for nine months.
A Reason To Be Happy
If you don’t think that’s sufficient reason for me to be happy and peaceful inside, this evening, despite the winds and the rain and the cold outside, well, I guess you just haven’t understood anything yet about Holy Slavery to Jesus through Mary. Yes, there’s something heart-warming and captivating about this great feast of Holy Slavery that one can hardly describe. It can only be compared to the sense of security and peace that comes from practicing Holy Slavery itself.
I venture to say that it springs from the thought – the astounding thought! – that God’s own Son, the Second Person of the Most Blessed Trinity, should have felt safe. Safe and secure in Mary’s womb, then later in her arms. What slave of Mary wouldn’t feel safe and secure after such an example!
I don’t know why I’m thinking of peace and security tonight. Perhaps it’s because of the winds and the storms outside my window. Perhaps, too, it’s because I was reading today about a new bomb capable of destroying a whole city the size of New York and extending its destructive force to a radius of some seventy-five miles. A terrifying prospect indeed, to put it mildly . . . but one likely to put the fear of God in many a rebellious heart. To me, however, it simply served as a reminder of my utter dependence on God, of my slavery to God and to His Blessed Mother.
Do You Realize Your Dependence on God?
Did you ever stop to think that your dependence on God is absolute ? . . . that it is a continual, a never-ending thing ? . . . that if God abandoned or ”forgot” you even for an instant you would return into nothingness, you would be snuffed out of existence more swiftly, more devastatingly than by any man-made bomb!
Did you ever realize that you cannot do a thing without God’s help ? No, nothing either in the natural or the supernatural order. You cannot even have a good thought worthy of super-natural grace without God’s help! And since Mary is related to you, especially in the order of grace, since she is the Mediatrix of all God’s graces, you can do nothing without her either! See how total your dependence on Jesus and Mary is?
Is it any wonder then that one gets a sense of absolute security and confidence when one acknowledges this total dependence by the consecration of Holy Slavery ? . . . when one tries to live this dependence in every action of the day? Yet, that’s all Holy Slavery really is: a practical acknowledgment of our dependence on God and His Holy Mother.
Author: Fr. Christopher Lee, SMM
This is the Twenty-third in a series of articles covering Consecration Aids.
But there was a warmth and a glow and a peacefulness in their eyes. Peacefulness in their hearts that could only come from their total surrender to Christ through Mary.
But I have another reason to be happy tonight, more so than on other nights. I suppose I should tell you why, although the telling will in no way equal the experience.
Consecration and Total Dependence
A few minutes ago I had the privilege of presiding at a family consecration ceremony in our Shrine Chapel here, at Queen of All Hearts. The ritual was simple. The father and mother and four children, ranging in ages from two to twelve, two boys and two girls, knelt side by side (the youngest just stood and watched quietly) before Our Lady’s altar.
Slowly and reverently they recited together their formula of consecration according to St. Louis de Montfort. (They had already written it out in long-hand. ) As the last words of the consecration, ”to the fullness of His age on earth and of His glory in heaven. Amen. ” resounded around our little chapel, one could almost sense Our Lady’s presence as she came down and smiled and took possession of her new little family in the Slavery of Love. One could almost see her smiling her approval to the parents first, then going from one child to another caressing them and pressing them to her motherly heart! And when I imparted to them my priestly blessing – the blessing of her divine Son – I knew she was standing by me, approving and multiplying the fruits of that blessing
by her prayers and charity.
Our Lady’s Presence
The ceremony was simple, to be sure, but one that involved a great deal. It was the complete return of the creature to its Creator. The return of a slave to its King and Queen, in a gesture of absolute trust and forgetfulness of self. It was Mary’s own Fiat being said once again. How it must have reminded her of that day. The day on which she proclaimed her slavery to God when she said: ”Behold the slave of the Lord.”
It was still raining and dreary and cold outside when Mary’s newest ”little family” left our chapel. They returned homeward a few moments ago. But there was a warmth and a glow and a peacefulness in their eyes and in their hearts that could only come from their total surrender to Christ through Mary. Somehow, in my enthusiasm, I cannot help but think that the day may not be far off when all our Catholic families will thus dedicate themselves to Christ their King through Mary, the Queen of All Hearts.
I reckon you understand now why there is sunshine inside of me on this day of total dependence, despite the winds and the rain and cold and menace of the bomb from the outside !
